@article{1478546,
      recid = {1478546},
      author = {Laub, John H.,  and Sampson, Robert J., },
      title = {Shared Beginnings, Divergent Lives : Delinquent Boys to  Age 70 /},
      pages = {1 online resource (352 p.)},
      abstract = {This book analyzes newly collected data on crime and  social development up to age 70 for 500 men who were  remanded to reform school in the 1940s. Born in Boston in  the late 1920s and early 1930s, these men were the subjects  of the classic study Unraveling Juvenile Delinquency by  Sheldon and Eleanor Glueck (1950). Updating their lives at  the close of the twentieth century, and connecting their  adult experiences to childhood, this book is arguably the  longest longitudinal study of age, crime, and the life  course to date. John Laub and Robert Sampson's long-term  data, combined with in-depth interviews, defy the  conventional wisdom that links individual traits such as  poor verbal skills, limited self-control, and difficult  temperament to long-term trajectories of offending. The  authors reject the idea of categorizing offenders to reveal  etiologies of offending--rather, they connect variability  in behavior to social context. They find that men who  desisted from crime were rooted in structural routines and  had strong social ties to family and community. By uniting  life-history narratives with rigorous data analysis, the  authors shed new light on long-term trajectories of crime  and current policies of crime control. Table of Contents:  Acknowledgments 1. Diverging Pathways of Troubled Boys 2.  Persistence or Desistance? 3. Explaining the Life Course of  Crime 4. Finding the Men 5. Long-Term Trajectories of Crime  6. Why Some Offenders Stop 7. Why Some Offenders Persist 8.  Zigzag Criminal Careers 9. Modeling Change in Crime 10.  Rethinking Lives in and out of Crime Notes References Index  The accounts of individuals are quite riveting, and the  book can be recommended strongly purely for the stories  provided about diverse lives. However, the book is much,  much more than that in terms of the serious challenge that  the authors' findings and ideas present to some of the  leading contemporary theories of both crime and  development. A highly original and scholarly contribution  of the highest quality.--Sir Michael Rutter, Institute of  Psychiatry, King's College LondonShared Beginnings,  Divergent Lives is an extraordinary work which shows the  deep insights gained by studying the whole life course,  beginning in childhood and ending in later life. With  access to a rare data archive, the authors provide  compelling evidence on the remarkably varied adult lives of  teenage delinquents who grew up in low-income areas of  Boston (born 1925-1935). The story behind these varied life  paths and their consequences inspires fresh thinking about  crime over the life course through models of life  trajectories and vivid narratives that reveal the  complexity of lives.--Glen H. Elder, Jr., University of  North Carolina at Chapel HillThis book redraws the  landscape of developmental criminology that Laub and  Sampson already have done so much to define, setting new  standards and benchmarks along the way. The authors both  provide new evidence for earlier conclusions and challenge  prevailing assumptions and assertions, thereby reshaping  the criminological research agenda for years to come.--John  Hagan, Northwestern University},
      url = {http://library.usi.edu/record/1478546},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674039971},
}